SUDAN FACES

July 14, 2008

At last, Sudan’s President Omar Hassan Al-Bashir may finally face judgment for his crimes. Luis Moreno-Ocampo of Argentina, prosecutor at the International Criminal Court based in The Hague, has asked the court for an arrest warrant. It comes three years after the U.N. Security Council requested him to investigate the atrocities in the Darfur region of Sudan.

The evidence covering the five years since 2003 has brought 10 charges against President Al-Bashir: three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. It is the first time a sitting head of state has been accused of such crimes. Moreno-Ocampo accuses Al-Bashir of both conceiving and implementing a plan to destroy three tribes in Darfur (the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa peoples) who rebelled against the Islamic government for its pattern of bias and marginalization against them. Khartoum then organized a local Arab militia, called the Janjaweed, and carried out a brutal counterinsurgency against civilians that has killed more than 300,000 people and left two and a half million homeless. “His motives were largely political. His alibi was a ‘counterinsurgency’. His intent was genocide,” the Prosecutor said.

Al-Bashir’s government uses rape as a weapon of war against his own people. One victim told of how when the forces surround the camp, “we run. Some of us succeed in getting away, and some are caught and taken to be raped—gang raped. Maybe around 20 men rape one woman. These things happen all the time. . . They rape girls in front of their mothers and fathers.”

The Prosecutor further pointed out the cruel nature of the crimes: “Al-Bashir organized the destitution, insecurity and harassment of the survivors. He did not need bullets. He used other weapons—rapes, hunger, and fear. As efficient, but silent.”

One of Sudan’s two vice-presidents denies the allegations, calling them “null and void.” President Al-Bashir points out that Sudan is not a party to the International Court and says it will ignore the announcement.

Although it will take months for any action against Al-Bashir to take place, at least the indictment calls the world’s attention to the genocide he is carrying out in plain view.

Manute Bol’s Tall Order
“The key to peace is education”

Much has been said and written about Manute Bol and most of the focus has been on his fabulous nine-year career as the tallest person to ever play in the NBA. But there is a deeper side to the seven-foot seven native of Sudan who resides in Olathe, KS and calls the village of Turalei in Southern Sudan his home.

An un-educated young man when he came to the U.S. to attend school and play basketball in 1983, Manute has since come to place a high value on education. He knows that one of the important keys to peace in Sudan is education for its children. There are 100 students and five teachers in Manute’s home village, but no schoolhouse. They teach and learn under trees and when it rains, as it often does in Southern Sudan, there is no school.

HERE IS YOUR OPPORTUNITY TO HELP MANUTE BUILD A SCHOOL IN TURALEI. A team is forming to make construction of a school a reality for the children in Manute’s home village. Will you help? Click on SUDAN SUNRISE on Blogroll to findout how.

COURAGEOUS JOURNEY, a new book by Ayuel Leek Deng, Beny Ngor Chol and Barbara Youree, will be on bookshelves in September 2008.

This narrative non-fiction book is set in the context of the civil war in Sudan, which ended in 2005. Ayuel and Beny tell their own experiences fleeing their burned villages and making their exodus along with thousands of other displaced children who had lost their families.

They walked for months across barren land, menaced by starvation, disease, wild animals, and shrapnel from helicopter fire. The story follows the evolution of their thinking from revenge to peaceful solutions as they spend fourteen years in refugee camps. The Arab Islamic government of Sudan wished to impose their strict sharia laws on the black Christian and Animist south and claim the newly discovered oil reserves.

News coverage has been sketchy of this conflict—which preceded the present Darfur crisis. During a 20-year period, the war took the lives of over two million southern Sudanese. Thousands more were tortured, displaced or sold into slavery. The two heroes of the story, Ayuel Leek and Beny Ngor, now enrolled in U. S. colleges, are working diligently to set up a non-profit organization to help improve conditions for the people still living in Sudan and to support the refugees—especially other Lost Boys and Girls—in the United States.

This human-interest story coupled with the timeliness of many issues facing the world today—terrorism by radical Islamic groups, ethnic hatred, religious conflict, control of limited oil reserves, immigration problems, and reference to the 9/11 attack on the United States make this a fascinating read.

This 330-page, hardcover book from New Horizon Press is available now at the pre-publication price of $16.47 on Amazon.com. (regular price $24.95).

February 21, 2008
Between 2,000 and 10,000 refugees, fleeing from Darur, are trapped at the border with Chad. The situation remains unclear because humanitarian workers have had to evacuate the zone. Local rebel commander Abbas Mohamed said a dozen civilians were killed and 20 arrested Tuesday during the latest government attack in the Jebel Moon area in West Darfur. Mohamed accused the government troops and their janjaweed militarian allies of stopping the refugeess and trapping them at the border. The fighting continues.

Chad Wants Refugees Out
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February 13, 2008
Nouradin Koumakoye, Prime Minister of Chad, warned Sudan’s government that if the refugees from that country are not transferred elsewhere, he would expel them. He claims that the presence of Darfurian refugees is fomenting violence. He insists they are a destabilizing force, which led to the Chadian rebels recent attack on the capital city. Over the weekend 12,000 more refugees fled to Chad following an attack on their villages in Darfur.

Commander in Chad of the EU force, Brig. Gen. Jean-Phillippe Ganascia, said that had the EU peacekeepers been in place, they would not have intervened in Chad’s internal conflict. He hoped the initial units would arrive by the end of February and the entire force within three months.

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February 11, 2008

Air strikes over the weekend by the Sudanese military sent 12,000 refugees from Darfur fleeing across the border to neighboring Chad. Men on horses and camels, apparently janjaweed, burned and pillaged the villages, killing 200. The Darfur rebels, target of the attacks, say they were not in the villages at the time.

The refugees join the 400,000 already camped in Chad, an increasingly volatile area since the rebels there recently attacked the capital city. They accused President Idriss Dby of corruption and embezzling millions in oil revenue.

The Sudanese military continue to ignore the U. N. resolutions that forbid military flights over the region. It has been a year since the U. N. and African Union began a new effort to find a political settlement for Darfur. The violence escalates and again the innocents are left terrified and destitute.

Only recently have Americans heard much about the country of Sudan in far away Africa. We get a few images on nightly news about the horrible conditions in the refugee camps where Darfurians have fled from their burned villages and where they are continually attacked raped and starved.

But during the civil war in that country (1983-2005) the coverage was near nil. In 1990 during the First Gulf War, Sudan was totally blocked out. Their government did not back the U.S.

During that first civil war, atrocities beyond belief were happening while most of the rest of the world went merrily shopping and keeping up with their favorite sports teams. Over 2 million died and thousands more were displaced.

In a nutshell, the Black, Christian and Animist South rebelled against the Arabic, Muslim government’s oppression in the North out of the capitol in Khartoum. They sought to restrict religious freedom, enforce Islamic sharia laws, deny education, refuse to share the wealth, and even attempt to move the North/South dividing line to place the newly discovered oil fields into the North.

To help move southern Sudanese off this oil rich land, the government enlisted the help of the Darfurians (Baggara tribes) who were black like the Southerners, but Muslim like the Arabic Northerners. They armed them with guns, tanks and horses. “You don’t want to be ruled over by infidels, do you?” they were told.